Two Sides of the Same Coin
by EinsteintheDragonSlayer
Summary: DISCONTINUED. Hitsugaya Toshiro has recently come back from the Quincy War, and his experience with zombification during the battle left him reeling. Unable to find solace in anyone, he takes some time off to go to the World of the Living. There he meets a girl who, despite seeming to be his polar opposite, might just be the only one who truly understands him.
1. Chapter 1

**Er, hello! This is my first fanfiction, so I am releasing this chapter as a sort of "pilot". I thought it was necessary to use this chapter to introduce not only the story but Hitsugaya-taicho as he is presented here. I had originally planned to incorporate dialogue and action but when I got to the point that you'll see at the end I realized it just didn't quite fit, but rest assured the next chapters will be more eventful. This is set a bit after the Quincy war and Hitsugaya-taicho is not handling his "zombification" all that well. Kubo Tite wasn't able to grace us with our favorite prodigy's thoughts on the matter so I thought I might want to try to dive into his mind and see what he would've thought myself. Enjoy! (I hope)**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach. (Thank goodness)**

As Hitsugaya Toshiro walked from Urahara's shop clad in a gigai and clothes appropriate for the winter season, he pretended he didn't see the knowing expression on the man's face when he explained that he wasn't sent there officially. The former Twelth Division captian was far too intelligent for his liking; it made him feel as if the decades he spent perfecting the cool mask he wore daily were for nothing. He wandered aimlessly for a while after he dropped his few items off at one of the houses Soul Society finally decided to buy for visiting Shinigami. Soon he found himself at the edge of town, and saw that he was near a forest covered in snow. With nothing better to do, he made his way towards the trees.

Toshiro sighed, watching his breath leave him in little white swirls. Today should've been a good day. Six inches of snow covered the ground, soft and untouched and pure white. Matsumoto was surely suffering by now; no doubt having discovered that her taicho had left her alone with the paperwork. Yet despite this he couldn't bring himself to enjoy the satisfaction of playful revenge nor the tranquil beauty of the forest he walked through. He hadn't come to the World of the Living for either of those reasons, anyway. Here, alone, he could admit to himself the true purpose of this visit.

Toshiro was a man who enjoyed a large measure of control in his life, and when some of that control was taken away he far too easily lost his temper. Years of, "Come back here, Matsumoto!" and, "That's Hitsugaya-taicho to you!" attested to that. So, when one sadistic Quincy took control of _everything_ ; took control of his mind, his body, his loyalty, his honor, his _clothes,_ his _life_ , he was left shaken and scarred and more vulnerable than he'd ever felt. He couldn't bring himself to look at Soul Society the same way, not after he betrayed it and the people inside he cared about. It didn't matter if it wasn't his fault, and he was intelligent enough to acknowledge that. He felt violated. He knew Matsumoto went through the same thing, but their personalities were too different for her to experience and understand what he was going through. While she was more than capable of being perfectly serious when she needed to be, she was undoubtedly a quirky, bubbly, frivolous woman. She was subdued for a couple weeks, but soon she was back to her old self. He didn't begrudge her this at all. If anything, he was relieved. He didn't want anyone to feel this way, except perhaps Giselle herself. At least she was dead. But the pain didn't go away or even lessen.

Toshiro's eyebrows furrowed as he contemplated this. The prodigy had yet to find a problem that couldn't be solved when given enough time to think, but he was sure that he must be biased. He knew what he truly needed: he needed someone who could understand him. However much he wanted it, though, he couldn't deny that no one like that existed among the Gotei 13, which left him feeling overwhelmed and disheartened. He couldn't deal with this alone, but he was left alone nonetheless, which was something that seemed to happen a lot. Only, this time, something was different. Whether it was due to the severity of what happened, the acutely personal nature of it, the way that this conflict piled on top of an impossibly tall mass of other problems, or a combination of the three, he didn't know. But what he did know was that this time he truly doubted his ability to get past this, and that scared him more than anything.

The white-haired captain was jolted out of his thoughts by an unexpected change in the scenery he was barely paying attention to. Allowing his eyes to focus, he saw a bundle of black interrupting the white throughout the forest. He stopped, looking closer, and found that the "bundle" was a human sitting against one of the trees. Further inspection revealed the human to be a girl, with chin-length black hair, pale skin, and dressed entirely in black. His eyes roamed over torn jeans, combat boots, and a long but simple coat. Her knees were drawn to her chest and her head was buried in her arms on them, preventing him from seeing her face. Then, she looked up and Toshiro found himself hiding behind the nearest tree for reasons unknown to him. Shouldn't he just walk up to her? Yet something kept him from approaching and he watched, eyes widening, as she moved to take off her coat and fold it with oddly steady hands, laying it aside to reveal nothing but a thin t-shirt. _What is she doing?!_ He thought incredulously, _She must know she'll fr- oh. Is that it?_ As it suddenly dawned on him what she was doing, he panicked.

He ran towards her and put his hand on her shoulders to look at her, and noticed several disturbing things in the span of a moment. First, she wasn't shivering. Second, her lips were all but blue. Third, while her eyes were open they were glazed over, not reacting to him even though he was only inches away from her. Reacting without pausing to think, he quickly withdrew his soul candy dispenser and popped one in his mouth, almost yelling at the artificial soul to catch up to him at his house as he gathered her in his arms and shunpoed away, vaguely wondering why he was so upset about this.


	2. Chapter 2

**Guten Tag, humans! I feel the need to inform you of something. I am not at all satisfied with this new development to my story. Unfortunately, after much nitpicking, I can only conclude that my skill level is not enough to reach the desired goodness I hoped for. Therefore, I can only give you this. It is up to you, dear readers, to discover if my conclusion is based on fact or bias. Maybe its actually good, maybe its even worse than I thought! There is only one way to find out. Read on!**

 **And, of course, I do not own Bleach.**

Swinging the door open, Toshiro all but skidded into the house holding the girl, not bothering with his shoes. Once inside, he slowed down enough to lay her on the couch gently before he began to set about looking for things to warm her up. Hurrying upstairs, he grabbed a couple blankets from the guest bedroom and a coat from his own closet. Down at the bottom of the staircase he found the thermostat and, grimacing slightly, turned it up significantly. He heard a knock at the door and opened it to reveal his gigai panting heavily. At this point he had managed to calm down completely. _Good thing Matsumoto isn't here to see this,_ he thought, _she'd have stars in her eyes and say something like, "It's love at first sight, Taicho!"_

Sliding once again into his artificial body, he walked over to the teen (he now recognized her to be at least fourteen) and sat behind her, propping her up against his chest. From that position, he put his coat on her arms and the blankets on both of them. _At this rate I'm going to have a heat stroke trying to save her from hypothermia_ , he mused, only half joking. Resting his head against the back of the couch beside him, he waited. As the minutes passed, he fought to stay awake as the heat dulled his senses and relaxed him. He knew it would be bad enough for the girl to wake up in a stranger's house; if he was asleep she might be able to get past him and leave, and he wanted to find out for sure what she was doing all alone in the middle of an icy forest. If it was what he thought it was, he couldn't exactly leave her to herself.

In the back of his mind, he wondered why he didn't just drop her off at a hospital. They could treat her hypothermia and anything else, and he wouldn't have to involve himself with a human. Another part of him argued that she needed to get help too fast for his gigai to handle, and he couldn't very well walk into a hospital with her in his arms in his regular form. Unfortunately, even to him that sounded weak. Putting the thought aside to deal with later, he focused on observing her body temperature. He didn't have a thermometer, but he was sure she was warmer than when he found her. He could even see the color subtly returning to her fingers and lips. He noticed that her hair was unkempt and probably not even brushed, and her clothes were battered and worn. He wondered if she was too poor to take care of herself or simply didn't care.

A little more than an hour had passed before he felt her stir. Looking down, he saw her eyes open slowly. As she began to gather her bearings, she stiffened and twisted sharply to look at him. He let go of her quickly and put his hands up in a placating gesture. "Don't panic," he said, "I'm just trying to help. Can you tell me your name?"

She leaned further away from him and didn't answer immediately. Instead, she looked around the room and he could swear he saw her shoulders just barely slump in disappointment. She turned back towards him and looked at him for a couple seconds before he saw confusion and something else disappear from her face and the corner of her mouth turned up in an expression that made the word "cynical" pop into his head, although he technically couldn't find anything wrong with it. "Oh dear," she said a little too sweetly, "It appears I caused you some trouble. Sorry about that. My name is Hana, and you are?"

"Hitsugaya Toshiro," he replied simply, deciding it would be better to play her game than call her out.

"Well, Hitsugaya-san, you've been a great help. I've no wish to take up any more of your precious time, so I'll be heading out now," she announced as she moved to push off the blankets.

"I can't let you leave yet," he blurted. Silently, he cursed himself for being so blunt. He shouldn't have panicked at her words, it wasn't normal for him.

The girl froze, tensing visibly. "And why is that?" she asked without looking at him.

Quickly thinking of a rational argument to cover his blunder, he said, "For one, you're in no condition to walk home, especially in this weather. I'm also a little worried about what you might do if you get there, given the circumstances surrounding this "incident" seem to be more than a little questionable." He felt irrationally proud that what he said made sense, and he struggled to push the feeling down.

"Worried about me?" she inquired, clearly struggling to keep her voice steady, "I don't recall my life being the business of a stranger."

"All the same, I can't help how I feel. You're undoubtedly far too tired to fight me on this, so if you could please just answer my questions, I'd appreciate it."

He watched her struggle with her pride for a moment before giving him a terse nod.

"Do you live alone?"

"Yes."

"Do you have any family?"

"No."

"Any close friends?"

"No."

"Then you have two choices. I can take you to the hospital, or you can stay here with me. What'll it be?" he finished.

Her eyes widened in disbelief. He vaguely surprised himself with that statement, but he didn't let it show on his face.

"Stay with you?" she asked, unable to hide her incredulity anymore, "Why would you offer to do that for a stranger?"

"No idea," he answered, "But I can't deny that someone needs to hold you accountable."

At this, the shock once again left her face, replaced with suspicion.

"What's the catch?"

"There is none."

"Bull."

"Understandable. It doesn't change your decision, however. You can trust a stranger, or go to a hospital," he said.

He watched her as she worked her jaw, thinking harder than he thought she would. Then, "Fine. Where am I staying?"

He hadn't expected that. He didn't regret offering, but he had thought she wouldn't trust him enough to stay with him. However, he simply replied, "I have a guest bedroom upstairs. You can stay there tonight, and we'll get your stuff tomorrow. But first, I'll be making some tea. Just because you're awake doesn't mean you're fully recovered. Once you've finished you need some sleep. You can borrow something of mine to wear."

Without waiting for a reply, he stood up and headed to the kitchen. Setting a kettle on the stove, it finally occurred to him to wonder what he had just gotten himself into. As he thought about it, though, he couldn't bring himself to dread dealing with a damaged adolescent. Deciding there was little use worrying about it, he simply took the steaming water off the stove to prepare the tea.

Bringing a cup back into the living room, he found her sitting up with her arms hugging herself over his coat and her head hanging down. He cleared his throat, and her head shot back up to look at him. Quickly, she moved out of the position, and he wisely chose not to comment. He suddenly noticed her eyes were a bright golden brown that really didn't match the dark aura of the rest of her. Silently, he sat down next to her and handed her the tea.

Taking a sip, she broke the silence, "I gotta ask, is the hair natural? If not tell me where you go to get it done because that person has a lot of talent."

Resisting the urge to roll his eyes at both the topic and the intentional bluntess of the question, he turned to her and responded, "Unfortunately for you, it is very natural. And, in case you were wondering, I'm not wearing colored contacts either."

"Oh, I'm not so sure I find that so unfortunate," she mused.

"Why's that?" he asked.

"It'd be a shame if you weren't naturally this hot," she said, once again not bothering to hide her frankness.

Scoffing, he got up to take the blankets upstairs, pausing to turn the thermostat back down. After making the bed, he walked into his own room to find something she could sleep in. He pulled a t-shirt and some sweatpants from his dresser and made his way back to the guest room. As soon as he walked in, he noticed her standing inside with her back facing him. "I didn't hear you come upstairs," he said as he moved towards the bed and set the clothes down.

Instead of answering, she simply shrugged and took off his coat, handing it to him. He walked out and took hold of the doorknob, pausing to tell her to come get him if she needed something before shutting it.

He made his way back downstairs and sat on the couch. Despite the events of the day making it seem late, the sun hadn't even set. He wondered how long he would be able to stay here before his duties to Soul Society called him back. He doubted his ability to help the girl named Hana enough to leave her alone in time, but he felt like he had to try. She looked like she must be as broken as himself. Suddenly, he froze. His eyes widened enormously as a thought occurred to him. From the moment he saw her out in the woods, he had never once thought about the events during the Quincy war. Never had he gone so long without it bringing him down, yet a mere human child somehow managed to make them seem, for a little while, as inconsequential as a passing breeze. That was what drew him to her. Although she was cynical and withdrawn and didn't seem to like him very much, for whatever reason she was in just as much pain as he was, maybe even more. Maybe that was why she agreed to stay even though she had no reason to trust him. She had no family or friends. The loneliness of a life like that couldn't _not_ eat at someone. Maybe she couldn't stop herself from hoping that she could ease that loneliness here. Regardless, he couldn't shake the feeling that every decision he made today had been good and right, even though they shouldn't have even made sense.


End file.
